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I don't have any textual basis for this, but I thought of the Torturers as tracing their lineage back to Typhon. This is sort of the reverse of your impression; the institution would have started out as secular, and then acquired its mystical aspects in order to maintain its cohesion over time.<br><br>--
"When small men begin to cast big shadows, it means that the sun is about to set." -- Lin Yutang<br><br><br><br>> From: sonofwitz@butcherbaker.org<br>> To: urth@lists.urth.net<br>> Date: Sat, 22 Nov 2008 11:44:16 -0800<br>> Subject: Re: (urth) Severian as reverse Christ (or something)<br>> <br>> <br>> On Nov 22, 2008, at 10:19 AM, Dave Tallman wrote:<br>> <br>> > David Stockhoff wrote:<br>> >> In similar vein, discussing "what offices a Christian man may <br>> >> hold", he refers to a recent case wherein a Church member had the <br>> >> opportunity to receive high public office as a magistrate. <br>> >> Tertullian argues that it would be morally impossible for this man <br>> >> to satisfy both the Gospel's demands and those of Roman law, for <br>> >> that would require him to abstain not only from all public pagan <br>> >> sacrifices, oaths, etc., but also from "sitting in judgment on <br>> >> anyone's life or character, . . . neither condemning nor fore- <br>> >> condemning; binding no one, imprisoning /or torturing no one/".^*2 <http://www.rtforum.org/lt/lt119.html#FN_2 <br>> >> >* These are the earliest known explicit Christian statements on <br>> >> the morality of torture.<br>> >><br>> > Wolfe may have drawn some ideas from Tertullian, but he surely <br>> > wouldn't consider him to be the last word on Christian morality. A <br>> > couple of centuries later St. Augustine wrote on the idea of a "just <br>> > war," which could be fought by righteous Christian soldiers. <br>> > Tertullian ended up being declared a heretic (not about pacificism, <br>> > but about whether a new prophecy could have the same force as <br>> > scripture).<br>> ><br>> > Tertullian had the luxury in the third century of belonging to a <br>> > persucuted group that could stand outside and condemn the system. <br>> > But later the Church became the accepted state religion, and took <br>> > over a great deal of power in the Middle Ages. At that point, <br>> > soldiers, magistrates, and even torturers were at least nominally <br>> > Christians. It's a difficult moral dilemma and one that Wolfe <br>> > doesn't shrink from presenting in all its horror.<br>> <br>> <br>> On that note, I've taken the Torturer's Guild as a sort of Inquisition <br>> that's become a more or less secular institution of the State. As if <br>> the State absorbed them and gradually became more and more ashamed of <br>> the Guild, yet kept it around in diminished form for their dirty work. <br>> but it's lost it's original purpose. Of course that's all <br>> speculation, but it works for me.<br>> _______________________________________________<br>> Urth Mailing List<br>> To post, write urth@urth.net<br>> Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net<br><br /><hr />Windows Live Hotmail now works up to 70% faster. <a href='http://windowslive.com/Explore/Hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_faster_112008' target='_new'>Sign up today.</a></body>
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